[the urban politician]

I found this interesting, as is being played out in Pilsen (this trend towards having "spot" fees and "spot" policies in various places in the city troubles me, though):

May 10, 2021 09:51 AM UPDATED 47 MINUTES AGO
Pilsen demolitions resume with anti-gentrification fees attatched

The owners of a trio of buildings on 18th Street are the first to pay the $15,000-per-building surcharge, with the money going toward affordable housing.

Dennis Rodkin


The owners of a trio of vintage buildings on 18th Street in Pilsen are the first to take out demolition permits under the city’s new anti-gentrification plan that tacks $15,000 onto the existing cost of taking out a permit.

The Chicago City Council in late March approved the surcharge for demolitions in most of Pilsen and along the western reaches of the 606 Trail as a way to slow gentrification that displaces long-term residents.


The $45,000 “will bring benefits to our community that this development wouldn’t have brought in” prior to the new rules, said Pilsen-area Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez, 25th.


The $15,000-per-building fee will act as a disincentive to demolition in some cases, Sigcho-Lopez said, but “these developers saw it would still be profitable for them, with the fees.”


The buildings, just west of the 18th Street station on the CTA’s Pink Line, are owned by a limited liability company called Fox Chicago, which is not related to the television station. It’s associated with Oak Park-based development firm R.P. Fox & Associates and its affiliate, Fox Investment Management.


Mike Fox, an executive with the firm, did not respond to a request for comment; neither did Maria Cristiano, an attorney at the Oak Park law firm Pellegrini & Cristiano who is listed as the LLC’s agent.

Sigcho-Lopez confirmed the trio of permits—which first surfaced last week on Chicago Cityscape, an online permit-tracker—are the first demolitions in Pilsen since the new surcharge took effect. Crain's could not determine when the demolition is scheduled to occur.

The three buildings contain a total of 17 apartments, according to the Cook County Assessor. Built between 1894 and 1914, they are on a block of mostly the same vintage. A new replacement building would be the first on the block since the middle of the 20th century, from the look of the neighboring structures. In a four-block stretch of 18th Street, there are only three or four structures built in the 21st century.

It’s the second attempt at demolition for these three buildings. In 2019, Fox executives withdrew a plan to raze the buildings, according to Block Club Chicago, and said they would rehab the structures instead.

At the time, the city was considering landmarking a swath of Pilsen containing hundreds of buildings in an attempt to slow gentrification. If the owners of these three buildings had pursued demolition, city officials would have been forced to make a quick decision on the landmark district proposal.

By switching their plan to rehab, Sigcho-Lopez said at the time, the owners gave the Pilsen community time to fully mull over the landmarking proposal. The landmark plan died in December 2020, and in March a new package of anti-gentrification ordinances, including the demolition surcharge, was approved.


Now that Fox has switched its plan back to demolition, Sigcho-Lopez said he is disappointed but “not surprised” and reiterated that he believes the $45,000 contribution toward affordable housing “does something that is needed in the community.”

Fox’s plan for the three-building site is not clear. Sigcho-Lopez said nothing has been submitted to him yet, but that the firm’s 2019 plan “was fine for the block, as I remember it.”

The 2019 proposal was for a four-story building with street-level retail and nine apartments on the upper three floors.

Fox may have made the calculation that it could offset the $45,000 by charging higher prices for the units it builds on the site, whether for rent or for sale. In the two years since the firm first proposed demolition, the cost of both types of housing have risen.

Fox bought the three buildings in June 2016 for $950,000, according to the Cook County Recorder of Deeds. They appear to have been vacant since 2019, when the Sun-Times reported a gift shop that had been in the center building for 19 years was closing so the buildings could be demolished.

The other two businesses, a used furniture store and a candy store, had already closed by that time.

https://www.chicagobusiness.com/resi...-fees-attached